Tyne and Wear - Politics

Politics

See also: List of Parliamentary constituencies in Tyne and Wear

Tyne and Wear is divided into 13 Parliamentary constituencies. Historically, the area has been a Labour stronghold, South Shields is the only Parliamentary constituency that has never returned a Conservative Member of Parliament (MP) to the House of Commons since the Reform Act of 1832.

General Election 2010 : Tyne and Wear
Labour	Liberal Democrats	Conservative	BNP	UKIP	Others	Green	National Front	Trade Union & Socialist	Christian Party	Turnout
239,211 +7,338	106,380 +9,129	105,117 +30,595	23,740 +20,071	8,731 +4,876	3,766 +59	3,186 +1,932	599 –398	266 N/A	131 N/A	491,304 +73,971

Overall Number of seats as of 2010
Labour	Liberal Democrats	Conservative	BNP	UKIP	Others	Green	National Front	Trade Union & Socialist	Christian Party
13	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0

At the level of local government, three of the region's five unitary authorities were controlled by Labour in 2005, the exceptions being Newcastle City Council and North Tyneside Council. Since an upset result in the local elections of 2004, the former has been controlled by the Liberal Democrats. No one party has overall control of North Tyneside Council: while the Conservatives hold the greatest number of seats, 28, they lack an overall majority, there are 32 other councillors. North Tyneside is the only authority in the area with a directly elected Mayor. Currently a Conservative member.